1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to an apparatus and a method for receiving digital broadcasting. More particularly, the present invention relates to an apparatus and method of reducing power consumption while receiving digital broadcasting in a mobile terminal.
2. Description of the Related Art
Mobile digital broadcasting technologies have been rapidly developed recently. The mobile digital broadcasting standards adopted throughout the world can be generally classified into three technologies: first, Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB), which has been adopted in South Korea as a standard for mobile broadcasting, second, Digital Video Broadcasting-Hand Held (DVB-H), which is currently expected to be adopted in Europe, and third, media Forward Link Only (FLO) technology, which has been developed by Qualcomm Incorporated of San Diego, Calif.
As the development of digital broadcasting technologies has grown, mobile terminals having functions for receiving the digital broadcasting have been developed so that users of the mobile terminals can watch the digital broadcasting while moving.
The mobile terminal has a disadvantage in that usable power is limited due to portability. Accordingly, various technologies have been suggested to assure that a minimum capacity of a battery remains so that basic telephone functions of the mobile terminal can be used. One of these technologies is that if the capacity of the battery of the mobile terminal becomes low, the mobile terminal limits the operation of accessory functions. For example, when the user watches a digital mobile broadcasting of a sports game with the mobile terminal, if the usable capacity of the battery of the mobile terminal becomes lower than a predetermined value, the mobile terminal stops receiving and outputting the digital broadcasting to maintain sufficient power to perform the basic telephone functions of the mobile terminal. As another example, if the mobile terminal is operated as an MP3 player and the battery capacity of the mobile terminal reaches a low state, the mobile terminal stops playing the MP3 music files.
As such, when the capacity of the battery of the mobile terminal reaches a low state, the mobile terminal limits the accessory functions to maintain a minimum capacity of the battery to use the telephone functions. Therefore, as long as the battery of the mobile terminal is not charged, the mobile terminal does not perform any operations relating to the accessory functions.
With respect to the MP3 music files, these files are generally stored in a nonvolatile memory of the mobile terminal and thus the user can listen to the MP3 music files after charging the battery. In contrast, the user generally hopes to watch digital broadcasting in real time. However, the described power saving function of the mobile terminal causes the result that the user can not watch his/her desired program.
In addition, to decrease power consumption of the mobile terminal, a technology has been suggested in which the operations of components of the mobile terminal are stopped for a predetermined time, or operated with low power, if the user does not make an input for a predetermined time.
However, when the mobile terminal receives digital broadcasting, the user does not operate the mobile terminal while watching the digital broadcasting. Thus, this technology can not be applied to the components used for receiving and outputting digital broadcasting in the mobile terminal.